


The Ghost of McIntyre Castle

by Of_Princes_and_Savages



Category: Original Work
Genre: Adventure, Gen, Haunted Castles, Not sure what else to tag it, Original Character(s), Original work - Freeform, Pirates, feedback appreciated!, read it!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-08
Updated: 2016-09-11
Packaged: 2018-07-13 01:03:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7131773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Of_Princes_and_Savages/pseuds/Of_Princes_and_Savages
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The abandoned island off the coast of Buchanan Town is purportedly haunted by the ghost of Commodore McIntyre, but that doesn't prevent a young woman from routinely sneaking into the ruins of the old library to read alone. Until one day...she is not alone.</p><p>
  <em>An original story by Of Princes and Savages.</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Ghost and Miss Fairbairn

The tiny island off the coast of Buchanan Town had been called Commodores Cove since Abraham McIntyre had settled on it something like sixty years ago and built a castle-like fort and garrison for his men, defending the port city against pirates. Commodores Cove was also Commodore McIntyre’s base of operations, where he plotted his journey’s out to sea when he set out to hunt pirates, and where, eventually, his lovely bride Sarah had come to live with him.

But that was nearly sixty years ago, and few recalled the tall, thin Naval officer…in the flesh.

Because it was common knowledge in Buchanan Town that Castle McIntyre was haunted by the Commodore’s ghost. Strange sounds, lights, and tales to make one’s hair stand on end surrounded the abandoned island where only the brave and foolish dared to tread.

Rachel Fairbairn hoped she was one of the former, rather than the latter.

Although she was twenty years old, Rachel was a very slight, wispy girl. She had dark smooth hair she twisted up in a bun that was also wispy, with little curls coming loose around her pixish ears and bangs flopping over her forehead. Her eyebrows were a bit thick but she didn’t think they were furry, and she had large, dark eyes and a perky nose and lips that were fuller on the bottom.

A few of the town’s boys called her pretty, but most weren’t very interested in a thin girl with a childlike appearance and no prospects to speak of. Which suited Rachel fine because they were all quite dull and as soon as she were married she’d be chained to a stove and expected to raise babies. Which was not what she particularly wanted for her life. The idea of having children was terrifying: The mechanics alone had her quite unsettled if a few conversations she eavesdropped on were to be believed.

Besides, the idea of taking care of a husband and baby were rather unappealing. At least when she had to juggle managing the only bookshop in Buchanan Town, keeping money safely hidden from her father so that they might eat something more than the crusty bread they handed out at the church to the poor, and also keeping her father from drowning into that damned bottle he’d climbed into.

When she was about fourteen, Rachel had borrowed Old Mister Brown’s boat and rowed out to Commodores Cove. (She didn’t steal it, because she brought it back, line neatly tied to the docks the way it showed how to in a book of naval knots.) It used to take an hour and some, but know Rachel had it down to about forty-five minutes. She rowed into the channel that fed the broad moat running across the front of the castle, leading into the much large channel that formed the large cove that created the odd shape of the island. On a map, it looked something like an “ **e** ” turned upside down, with the little hole filled in.

Once she secured the boat to the surprisingly sturdy old dock under the bridge spanning moat, Rachel shimmied up the ladder and stood in on a platform, with the gates to McIntyre Castle in front of her, and the ruins of the old village behind her. Commodore McIntyre had allowed the families of his men to settle on the island, but very few of the little buildings remained.

The blacksmith’s shop, very nearby, was an exception. Rachel knew that because she’d investigated it thoroughly, finding nothing but a feral cat in the way of lifeforms. There were, however, a great many tools left behind. Rachel had found a hacksaw and immediately used that on the chain wrapped around the gate handles.

Well, no one lived there anymore, so it was hardly breaking in, was it?

There were twelve-foot brick walls on three sides of the castle. When Rachel peered into the courtyard for the first time, she felt excited at the thought of being the first person inside for decades. There was a layer of mildew on most everything, an old marble fountain and cobblestones all over the ground. One side of the courtyard made a sort of dock for a rotting ship sitting there in the harbor, and a gallows set up right in front of the entrance.

Rachel had explored the castle grounds for three or four trips, until she screwed up the courage to enter the castle. It was an imposing structure, at least four levels high, a thick square building with boarded-up windows and a small addition on the left side facing the cove that she realized was the dungeon. There was also a symbol painted on the doors of the dungeon that she recognized as meaning “ **PLAGUE** ” and promptly avoided. There was a wrought iron fence on the other side of the castle that Rachel clambered over to explore the long-overgrown garden, taking a moment to play on the tree swing, then struggled with the thick oak door that blocked her way any further into the estate.

Which prompted her to enter the castle, naturally.

There was a peculiar lock on the door. Instead of a traditional key, there were a number of buttons that clicked when you pressed them, only to CHUNK! after you pressed five of them. Each button had a symbol on them, and it took Rachel a good hour to realize the symbols were carved into the ornate woodwork around the doorframe.

Then it was just two more attempts and Rachel had entered McIntyre Castle.

Even now, at twenty, Rachel sometimes fancied that she was the lady of the castle. Or perhaps she was the archaeology exploring the lost tomb. It felt very much like exploring a tomb, because the tale of the poor lovers who lived here ended in death and disaster.

The plague had taken hold of the whole area, back then. Rachel supposed it was something like tuberculosis, or yellow fever, something transmittable within closed quarters. Someone in the prison could have caught it and transmitted it to Sarah, because while she was the lady of the castle, she was also a kind soul. She brought food and kind smiles to the prisoners, and perhaps she had caught something down there?

Either way, she had died, suddenly, and the Commodore had lost his mind with grief, flinging himself from the battlements into the sea. They only knew that because his long, lanky body had washed up on the shores of Buchanan Town, bloated and water-logged. Rachel had always felt so sorry for the officer and his wife, but it hit too close to home for her to pity Abraham McIntyre completely.

He committed suicide; Her father became a drunkard.

Neither of their wives would approve, surely.

There were many rooms in McIntyre Castle. Surprisingly, the rooms were in amazingly good condition. The furniture was still hole and cushions, while dusty, weren’t faded or stained. The wallpapers peeled a bit, but the wall hangings were still good. The carpet was worn and thin, but not molding. No windows were broken, despite the hurricane this castle had endured twenty years ago, and the roof held.

There was a portrait of Commodore McIntyre and Sarah hanging up in some sort of main room. Rachel wasn’t posh enough to tell a sitting room apart from a parlor, but she knew the portrait was done by a professional.

Abraham McIntyre was a tall man, by all accounts. He looked even taller because of his thin frame, a sharp face with a prominent nose, but surprisingly waggish green eyes and dark hair tied back in the fashion of his day, wearing a dark blue dress uniform from the waist up. Sarah was a beautiful young woman, with soft blonde curls and dark blue eyes. She stood beside the chair her husband sat in, with her slender arm around his shoulders, wearing a pretty off-white gown with dark blue ribbons that made her look more graceful and elegant than Rachel could ever hope to be.

They looked so happy and close in the portrait, and by all the stories they were as thick as thieves. It brought a sense of sadness to the castle, but there was something here that brought a foolish grin to Rachel’s face: The books.

There were books all over the castle: In hallway shelves, on tables. Commodore McIntyre's study must've had even more books, but there was a metal gate blocking the stairs to the second floor so Rachel wasn't sure. But the library! It was specially built because of both Abraham and Sarah’s love of the written word, and it was a bookworm’s paradise…or it must have been once.

The books were in amazingly good condition, but the shelves looked very empty. A few empty covers, the pages callously ripped out, lay strewn about in the discarded paper. Shredded bits of what may have been maps and demolished chairs splintered into the carpet, the stuffing torn out of the overturned couches, a broken table and a shattered vase or two. It was _wrecked_. Perhaps, in a fit of grieving rage, the Commodore had destroyed the library? What was left, though, were still fine old books that Rachel sat on the floor flipping through, basking in the sun streaming in from the big bay windows once she’d parted the heavy, dusty velvet curtains.

For the longest time, that library had been Rachel’s sanctuary. Her hideaway from the world, from Buchanan Town, and from her father. No responsibilities, no shops to run, just her and the far-off places and times captured in the pages of the book she held.

Until one evening, when she tarried too long over the second volume of a history text.

She’d been held from her sanctuary because her father took a nasty spill down the stairs and had to remain in bed for a few days. The old codger was fine now, his brains were so pickled he’d probably outlive Rachel as it stood now. So when she did make it into the castle and settled down to read, Rachel lost all track of time until the rumbling of a storm ripped her into the present. She’d known it was going to rain and had planned on leaving but…well, she hadn’t. And now she was stuck here until the storm stopped.

Rachel got up, dusting down her skirts and resolved to find herself a candle. She brought a small bag with her that had matches, a shawl and a few other things she needed in a drafty old castle abandoned before her grandparents had wed. So she’d thought a candle was just the trick, as the library began to darken from clouds blotting out the sun.

At least…she had thought it was until she heard the most unsettling noise: The rattling turn of a knob and creaking of the door hinges.

Footsteps. Male boots, entering the library.

And the decisive thud of the door shutting tight.

Someone was in the library.

Rachel had heard of a “fight-or-flight” instinct before. Hers reared its head and she scrambled beneath a nearby mahogany table as she realized the footsteps were coming towards her. The cobwebs that might hold venomous spiders barely caught her attention, easily batted away as she hunkered down and prayed that it was her own imagination. That she could just laugh this off and never speak about it to another soul. Because it couldn’t really be a ghost, could it? No. Ghosts weren’t real.

That was what Rachel decided…right before a pair of boots stepped into view.

Long boots, black and battered, staking long steps, much wider strides than Rachel could manage.

Rachel’s fear made way for curiosity (because if it was a ghost, she wanted to see what it looked like, of course,) and she assumed the rather undignified position of kneeling down with her chest pressed against her knees and her cheek nearly flat against the dirty floor, craning her neck to see the intruder.

Tucked into the battered boots were dark trousers that seemed too loose on a pair of long, spindly legs. The man had strode by so quick that now his back was turned to Rachel, so she couldn’t see much of his face, but she made note of his long dark coat that brushed his knees, and the shiny buttons on the cuffs where his long, thin hands stuck out. His hands were as pale as candle wax and Rachel shifted around, edging farther out, trying to see the man’s face.

In addition to the palest man she had ever seen, he must have been the tallest.

She saw the back of his head, his tousled, shaggy white hair, and slowly, as if he were studying the library, he began to turn so that she could see his right profile. His nose was sharp, that was the first thing she noticed. His lips were thin and his chin was sharp, all of his face was sharp, gaunt really. His eyebrow was pale and thick over his sharp green eye, and Rachel held in a sharp gasp.

Because in that long coat with brass buttons, with that shaggy hair, and as pale as he was, this could only be _the ghost of Abraham McIntyre._

And for all she held in her surprised gasps, perhaps she had failed. Perhaps she was too close to the edge. and had accidentally crawled from under the table. Perhaps he was a ghost and could sense such things.

Either way…

_He was staring right at her!_


	2. First Encounter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Minor edits were made to the first chapter because it alluded to Rachel being upstairs when it's barred in this one. Oops.

Rachel had heard her fair share of ghost stories. The sailors that came to Buchanan Town were a superstitious lot. As far as human apparitions went, the consensus was they would either ignore you as they went about their routine, or they would become angry and attack you.

She sat very still and hoped that Abraham McIntyre would be a case of the former.

He was not.

The ghost turned his head more towards her, his brow crinkling, and once she could see more than his profile, Rachel realized that the left side of his face was scarred with burns. The skin a shiny, pale pink and rough-looking, his ear crinkled with a similar texture. The scar went over his left eye, leaving his eyelid drooping over the eye and the skin puffy, both brow and lashes missing. She wasn't sure if that eye had sight at all, but Rachel's breathe still caught in her throat as she was trapped by his gaze.

Bugger.

No where in any story of Abraham McIntyre did it mention a severe burn scar...so this was not his ghost at all.

For his part, the man looked equally confused to find a living person in the library. He bent down a bit, squinting at her, and despite herself, Rachel felt that if she didn't speak first they would be here all day. Or longer.

Only the first thing to come out was: "Are you a ghost?"

Her voice was unnaturally loud, and perhaps a tad higher than usual, in the still library. Rachel watched her new acquaintance's remaining eyebrow bounce up, and he stood up straight as a rod and just as thin.

"How did you get in here? The door was locked," he rumbled in a dark baritone that made Rachel think of a shadowy bell tower. "You aren't some kind of fairy, are you?"

Rachel pursed her lips. "I asked you a question first."

"My castle. I get priority."

"So you are a ghost?"

"No!"

Rachel giggled, not without a touch of giddiness. "Oh! Good. I wouldn't know what to do if you were!"

The man paused and then rolled his eyes. "Run away, I should think. Good day then, fairy, flutter home."

He turned his back on Rachel and stalked deeper into the library as if that were that. Which it most certainly was not.

Rachel crawled from under the table, brushing off her dusty clothes and grabbing her satchel. She quickly flung it over one shoulder and dragged out two items: Her shawl, (a natty old gray thing fraying at the ends she couldn't bear to get rid of just yet,) and the kitchen knife she borrowed expressly in case she ever met a scoundrel on the island, or a mad hermit.

The man didn't appear to be much of a scoundrel, but appearances could be deceiving and Rachel had questions. So she wrapped herself in the shawl and kept the knife hidden underneath, looking like she was merely bundled against the growing chill, and trotted after the mystery man.

It occurred to Rachel as she rounded a corner to find the man repositioning candles in a tarnished candelabra, that he sounded different. Not from anywhere around Buchanan Town. But hardly a sailor, if only because he didn't pounce her on sight.

She used the hand not gripping her knife to dig out her little box of matches and offered them to the man. She really should make introductions soon, this was getting awkward.

Once the man noticed she had not "fluttered" home, he opened his mouth to say something and then snapped it shut again once he noticed the matches.

"Thank you," he nodded politely, fumbling a bit in the dark with long fingers to extract a matchstick.

"You're welcome," Rachel replied automatically. "So...am I trespassing now?"

"Mm?"

"You said this was your castle, ergo, I am trespassing on your property. Correct? And you might as well explain it to me because I've trespassed quite frequently over the years."

"Years?" he paused before striking the match on the side of the box. "How old are you? Sixteen? Seventeen?"

Rachel stood up a bit taller. "I am twenty years old. How old are _you_? Thirty?"

"I am twenty-five a week from Tuesday, thank you. And in my defense-" he stopped short, looking at her like he just noticed her for the first time as the first candle lit up. "I'm sorry, I can't properly retort when I don't know who you are. Jacob S. Savage, that's me."

Rachel hesitated only a moment. "Rachel, Rachel Fairbairn."

"So you are," Jacob S. Savage hummed, lighting the other candles and blowing out the match. "However, as you can see, Miss Fairbairn, it's difficult for me to tell when someone is fully grown. Head and shoulders above everyone, I am."

Rachel would concede that point. She pressed her lips together then and tilted her head back, reguarding him in the candlelight. The light was held in his right hand, blotting the left side of his face in shadows. The unblemished part of his face looked eerily like Commodore McIntyre's portrait, and Rachel noticed now that his good eye was the same sort of green. The left was dark and nearly shut, but she could have sworn...

"Is your left eye a different color?" Rachel blurted before she could help it.

Savage turned to the bookshelf in front of him. "Why?"

"Um, well, I was just sort of, you know, wondering. Is it? I've only seen cats with heterochromia before-"

"With _what_?" he looked so confused and scandalized that Rachel couldn't help giggling. "Miss Fairbairn, I am a healthy young man in _all_ ways, so unless I've given you the wrong impression-"

And _oh dear_ , now Rachel was outright laughing at the poor man. She dried her damp eyes with a corner of her shawl and sniggered, "Heterochromia is the scientific name for the condition of having two different colored irises. What did you _think_ it was, Mr. Savage?"

Rachel had often been told she was an impudent little snip, or a saucy little hussy. (Why always _little_? She was five-foot-seven.) And she knew her mouth almost always jumped ahead of her good sense. But sometimes it was fun seeing what a man would do if you needled him, just a little.

Belatedly, Rachel realized it was very poor judgement to tease a strange man in a dark castle with a storm breaking outside the boarded windows.

Fortunately, Jacob S. Savage simply sniffed, turning away like a snooty cat and returned to examining the bookshelves. "You strike me as a very imaginative girl, Miss Fairbairn. I'm sure you can come up with some possibilities. How did you get in if the door were locked? I know it locks back when you close the door, at least from outside-"

"No, not if you flip that lever by the door inside. It's rather brilliant, a self-locking door, isn't it? I wonder if Abraham McIntyre had it installed."

"He might've," Savage nodded distractedly. "Have you noticed how many puzzles are built into this place? Up in the attic, there's one of those sliding tile puzzles, you know? Where the picture is all jumbled up?"

"I've never been farther than the second floor landing," Rachel cocked her head slowly. "There's a sort of metal gate in the way. How did you open it?"

Savage moved further down the shelves, dragging a finger through the thick dust coating the wood.

"Well there was a mechanism in the wall," he explained. "If you arrange the proper sequence of weights, the gate would unlatch and you could slide it aside."

He stopped and tapped his dusty fingers against his chin thoughtfully.

"'Course I just pried the bars apart with a tool from the blacksmith's shop. Found out about the mechanism later."

Rachel bit back another giggle. She did not like being a giggle-box, no one took a skinny tittering girl seriously. "I used a hacksaw from the smith to cut the chain on the gate at the moat."

Savage gave her a look that was hard to interpret, but then he snickered.

"Well you're full of surprises, you are," he shook his head. "I might just call on that expertise to solve the castle's mystery someday, Miss Fairbairn."

"A mystery? What sort of mystery is there to solve?"

Savage stopped at the end of the shelves and leaned with his back against them. The candle shine on his burned side now, and Rachel wondered what caused such a scar.

"What do you know of the Commodore and his lady?" he asked. "Most people end the story at his leaping into the sea, an' romanticize the mysterious origins of Sarah. What do the people of Buchanan Town-assuming that _is_ where you came from,-have to say about him?"

Rachel rocked back on her heels. "Well, not much more than that I'm afraid. It was no secret that Sarah was brilliant, and that she and Abraham were madly in love. I think the only time they weren't together were, uh, well-"

"The gallows out front were functioning models, eh?"

"Extremely," she nodded. "Very popular entertainment at the time, but Sarah never attended once. She was supposed to be a very kind woman, that's how she caught her illness, down visiting the prisoners in the dungeon. Commodore McIntyre never let a single pirate escape him if he could manage it, he was nigh incorruptible."

Savage hummed, flicking his eyes up to the ceiling for a long moment. His thumb rubbed against the tarnished candelabra until Rachel thought he might very well polish the oxidization away.

"And what happened to their ships?"

"The pirate ships? Um, well, on the southwestern coast of this island, there's a little spot that the ships were either sunk on, or ran aground. I think. I've never been there but you here tales of the Grave of Galleys. A bit misleading since they aren't all galleons at all."

"And their treasure? The cargo?"

Rachel paused.

"I...I assumed that it was confiscated. Wasn't it?"

"Perhaps, but then...where did it go afterwards?" Savage asked, his gaze drifting down to hers. Rachel wasn't used to having men look her in the eye seriously, this was new. "Was it sent to Abraham's commanders? Was it reimbursed to the ships or countries from which it was stolen? Donated to Buchanan Town?"

"It's been sixty years and no one's ever found a hint of a treasure, not even so much as a map," Rachel said, not without curiosity. "Do you...do you mean to say, that there could be a hidden pirate treasure on the island?"

Savage grinned. His teeth were white but crooked, giving him a very shark-like smile that should have been unnerving, if his good eye didn't look so boyish at the same time. He flung a hand out and gestured with long fingers around the library, the movement so quick Rachel jumped. She hoped she didn't accidentally stab her arm with that secreted knife under her shawl, that would be embarrassing at this juncture. Still, who knew he could move so quickly?

"I don't know, but it's my castle so I think I'm entitled to snoop around. You haven't found any secret passages or hidden rooms down on the first floor, have you? I mean you've been trespassing for years, yeah?"

He wasn't teasing her, Rachel realized. She decided to shake her head, as solemnly as she could, and speak the honest truth: "No sir, nothing like that. Although I did find the key to one room hidden in a box. Now that you mention it this castle is a bit odd. I mean, not like it's haunted but...it's odd. Like a carnival fun house."

"Precisely," Savage nodded. "That means one of two things: Either there's a secret the good Commodore tried to hide, or he really was completely mental by the end of it."

Rachel pursed her lips. "So...there could be a secret door in a book case, right under our noses, leading to a hidden treasure?"

"Well, _I'd_ put a secret door in a library," he shrugged his shoulders. "A bit old-fashioned maybe, but secret bookshelf-doors are classic, innit?"

"I know just where to look!" Rachel chirped, the perfect location flashing in her mind's eye.

Savage's eyebrow rose up expectantly. "Where?"

That expectation gave Rachel a moment's pause.

She pressed her lips together and studied Mr. Jacob S. Savage critically, curling her fingers around the wooden handle of her knife. Just because he'd been cordial this long didn't mean he would be when money was involved.

"I won't tell you where unless you make a deal with me. Because if I help you find a secret treasure, I want a piece of it."


	3. By the book, by the books.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I MADE ART! At the end of this chapter is a link to a picture of Rachel Fairbairn and Jacob S. Savage from the last chapter, when she gives him a box of matches. Go and see it! (Read this first though!)

Jacob S. Savage was a tall man, he didn't stop growing until he was twenty and a towering six feet, seven inches tall. He looked down on most people, in a sense of height and morality. The latter because most people who looked down on his morals couldn't stick to their own standards, in his experience.

But this wisp of a girl? With her dark hair and brown doe eyes, with her plump pink lip jutting out, standing there bundled in a gray shawl over her purple and pink frock? She had spirit to stand up to a strange, ghoulish man in a dark castle without anyone around to leap to her aid. Not that Savage was going to hurt Miss Fairbairn. He'd never quite gotten his brother's taste for ultra-violence. Worst came to worse? He'd pull her out the castle and drop her in her boat back to Buchanan Town. It wasn't like the skinny little bird could hurt him, she looked as delicate as a bird's wing.

Then again, there were some innocent looking waifs back in Stuckrow that were all weepy eyes and pale faces until they had you by the throat demanding your valuables.

Savage shifted the candelabra in his hands. "What sort of deal are you after?"

Miss Fairbairn stood up a little taller. For a girl she was tall, maybe, but still a good foot shorter than him. Her eyes were level with the next to highest button on his vest. "If I help you find this treasure, and it does exist, I want a sixty-forty split. You may keep the lion's share."

Savage chuckled. " _I may keep the lion's share?_ How generous. Unfortunately I'll not accept less than eighty-five percent."

"Seventy-five."

"No."

"You'd leave me fifteen percent of a treasure and, what?" the girl frowned, motioning with the hand not tucked under the wool shawl. "Keep it here? Sleep on it like a dragon's horde? Eighty."

" _Eighty-five_ , not a copper less," Savage stretched himself up to his full height then, keeping the candles to his left to highlight his scar and cast a shadow over the healthier side of his face. "I have certain associates due sometime this week to help in my treasure hunt. We're to divvy what we find between us, and that makes your fifteen perfect look a little more generous, yeah?"

Miss Fairbairn pressed her lips together. "I want it in writing," she said at last. "A contract. I'll not be cheated."

Jacob S. Savage grinned. He'd been told he had a grin like a razorblade and hoped it came off as sincere as it was, not threatening. He was starting to respect this little fairy.

"As you wish Miss Fairbairn, right this way," he waved the candelabra forward, motioning back towards the main area and an overturned table. Once the table was righted, the candelabra set down to illuminate the darkness, Miss Fairbairn pulled a sheet of paper and a fountain pen from a bag by her side.

What else did she have in there?

"Alright, um, I, Rachel Martha Fairbairn," she began, spelling out words in bubble-like handwriting. "On the 7th day of the Blooming Star, in the year 2151, do solemnly promise to Jacob...what does the S. stand for?"

"Superior."

Rachel pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes. "You're a dreadful liar Mr. Savage."

 _'Oh innocent lamb, if only you knew.'_ Savage gave a careless shrug. "Just put down S., s'how I sign my name anyway."

"Alright. Um...to...Jacob S. Savage, to aid in the discovery and recovery of the pirate cargoes and wealth confiscated by Commodore McIntyre in his position as commander of the Navy stationed on Commodore Cove. Should the cargoes and wealth be found, Rachel Fairbairn shall receive no less than fifteen percent of the total wealth as compensation for her time and assistance-"

"You shall receive _no more_ than fifteen percent," Savage corrected, sitting on the edge of the table.

" _Fifteen_ , not a copper _less_ , to paraphrase your argument earlier," Rachel replied without looking up from her writing. "And the remaining share is to be divided between Jacob S. Savage and his associates, unavailable at the time of this document's creation, how they see fit. Is that amendable to you?"

Savage slid the paper from in front of her with one finger, then held it up to re-read. Date. Names. Terms. Percentages. Clear handwriting. The girl would do well as a clerk, or a solicitor.

"Amendable, where do I sign?"

"Uh, I haven't made a line yet, give it back please?"

Once Rachel scratched out a line and added her own looping signature, the dots above the I's in Fairbairn little circles and her fat E's looking almost like lowercase A's, he in turn signed Jacob S. Savage beside it. His J and S's always dwarfed the lowercase letters in his signature. Before he could dwell on the difference in handwriting too long, Miss Fairbairn snatched it back and stuffed it into her little satchel.

What _did_ she have in there?

With a little smile, then, Rachel spun around and marched towards a bookshelf against the wall connected to the rest of the castle. She had to stand on her toes, as this shelf in particular was just above her eye level, and she put a finger on the gape between what looked like an incomplete set of encyclopedias he had noticed earlier.

"See these books here? They look like encyclopedias, right?" she tapped the empty space. "Each book looks the same size, but the pages inside are hollowed out, so each one weighs a little different. And the letters don't make any sense on the sides."

Savage brought the candelabra over to look. Sure enough, and he had a better view of it, the books didn't even have proper titles on their spines. Just blank, blue-green spines with embosses lettering on the sides. They were about five in number, two letters to a spine and they spelled out _**WH-EA IT-LF-WO**_. Which was just nonsensical enough for him to realize it was a puzzle.

"So the books should be rearranged in order?"

"Yes, but I think there's at least one missing," Miss Fairbairn nodded. "I don't think there's more than one missing."

Savage ran a long finger around the dust on the shelf, squinting at the barely-visible seam of some sort of wooden insert. "There's some sort of pressure plate up here," he agreed, pushing down and feeling it move. "So if we were to find the missing book...?"

"It should open your classic secret door, yes," she giggled. "It's a distinctive-looking book, but I haven't found it on the ground floor. Have you seen it on the second floor?"

"I'll have to look. I've only been here three days, I'm still finding my way around. Been to the kitchens yet?"

"The door was locked, I think."

Savage snickered. "I should teach you to pick locks, Miss Fairbairn. That'd come in hand 'round here, don't you think?"

Rachel bit her lip, looking down at her toes. She'd yet to remove more than one hand from under her shawl, how flimsy was it to hold on? Then she grinned up at him and Savage thought that this wispy little thing might just be a bloody fairy after all. No one should have a smile that bright and wicked.

“But then...what would _you_ do?”

 _Very_ wicked little thing, Savage amended in his head as he turned to look out the windows. It was still dark, but it was late afternoon now. The storm had gone silent and seemed to blowing on to terrorize the people further south.

The fairy should return to her garden before it was dark.

“I’ll let you know when and if you should return, Miss Fairbairn. The storm is passing and it’s getting dark. You should go home.”

"Home" was a word that made her pretty face fall. Savage was not easily swayed by pretty young faces, (he could be, naturally, but just not so easily,) and a bird like Rachel Fairbairn was more than likely to have a protective father or big brother ready to defend her honor and a mother pacing the floor by now.

At least traditionally, that’s how it should be. Perhaps Rachel didn’t have a happy home life.

But she pulled her shawl tighter around herself and drew herself up tall. She seemed to do that when she wasn’t feeling very confident. A fake-it-til-you-make-it approach. He understood that, at least.

“I should be back in a day or two,” she said. “Will you wait for me before you try opening the door? No, on second thought, don’t. You’d have to find the book first, wouldn’t you? You can go ahead without me.”

And Savage knew he should: He’d had three days to himself in the quiet, drafty old castle. Legally it wasn’t his yet, maybe. But he intended to enjoy his solitude until Doc and the others showed up to rattle the walls with noise. At best he had another day for them to start showing up. Maybe a full week for the whole group to come together again.

He’d _miss_ the quiet.

“I’ll need help with the password. Code. Whatever,” he shrugged within his heavy coat. “I can wait a day or two, if I find it.”

Rachel hesitated a moment, before a glowing smile spread across her face. “I’ll be back quick as I can! Promise!”

And then she dashed off, turned around, and returned with an outstretched hand.

“I forgot my matches.”

Oh. Savage pulled them out of his pocket, he’d forgotten about that. Once he handed the little box to her, her other hand came up and squeezed his in something like a handshake. “Thank you!” she chirped, and away she went in a swirl of purple and pink and gray.

* * *

Rachel dashed down to her boat at the docks beneath the castle bridge, managing to tuck her little knife away without cutting herself. The air was cool and damp in the way a rain storm made it, but the sea was surprisingly calm. A bit choppy, but not enough to capsize her little borrowed boat.

When she got back to Buchanan Town, it was probably about seven o’clock. She hurried through the streets to the bookshop, above which was their apartment, and Rachel nearly slammed her face against the apartment door when she found it was locked.

Banging on the peeling paint covered wood, she called, “Father? Father it’s me! Unlock the door!”

It was a few long moments before the door opened. Jeremiah Fairbairn was tall, once, but he’d stooped a bit now. His nose was bright purple-red and his bushy eyebrows furrowed together as hazy eyes took in his daughter, standing outside with a lantern, and disarrayed hair. He still wore his dark vest, which was a good sign. If he was stripped to his undershirt and suspenders that would mean he was well into his cups by now.

“Where have _you_ been? Do you know what time it is, girly?”

“I know, but I got caught by the storm and had to stay with the Widow Fenwick by the docks.”

Lies. Of course. Her father didn’t much care what Rachel did as long as she had diner on the table by seven-thirty and had his laundry clean, but at the same time, he had very strict opinions about when she should be home. His sister had been a rather sprightly barmaid that got pregnant out of wedlock and she and the child died in the birthing process, and ever since, Jeremiah Fairbairn felt women should be at home or have respectable positions like seamstresses and shopkeeper wives.

If he knew Rachel went out alone to McIntyre Castle, (let alone met with a strange man today,) he’d have a fit that would make his whole head turn the same ruddy color as his nose.

Fortunately-Mr. Fairbairn had grown dull as the drinking set in. She was home now and that’s all that mattered, so he stalked away from the door and sat in the rocker by the window. He picked up the dark green bottle that was sitting on the sill and Rachel’s stomach sank.

“I thought, um, I thought Dr. Burrows said to lay off the drinking for a little while-”

“You can _lay off_ with that, girly!” he snarled. “I can handle my liquor just fine. That doctor just wants another chance to preach the evils of different men is all, the heather-rollin’ heathen.”

Rachel held in a sigh and a sharp, “You’d be dead if he didn’t take out you appendix last year!” There was no point. In defending the Weskridgian physician, or correcting a drunk Jeremiah Fairbairn.

She went to the kitchen and threw wood in the stove, stoking the fire back to life. Her father had let it burn down to the point where the stove was almost cold, dropping the temperature in the apartment to where she kept her sea spray soaked shawl wrapped around her until she could change clothes.

Funny. McIntyre Castle didn’t have a hot stove, and it never felt as cold as her home did...

* * *

 

**Artwork:[Rachel and Jacob meet.](http://of-princes-and-savages.tumblr.com/image/146205536296)**


	4. Starling Books

The next morning, Rachel woke up to the crash of a plate. Or a glass.

With a groan, she buried her head under her pillow, willing to ignore even her itchy, unbrushed hair tickling her face. If her brief, accidental glance out the window when she cracked an eye open was any indication, it was barely five in the morning, if that. The sky was still that rosy-purple of the earliest stage of daybreak.

The third floor of their building building, the attic, was where Rachel slept. It was terribly hot and stuffy in the summer, but rather pleasant in the winter. Two-thirds of the attic was full of old boxes and crates, some of which may have come with the building. The remaining third, the westward-facing window, was Rachel's room.

She had her bed and a hope chest that mainly served as her armoire at the foot of it, and a bookshelf she and a local boy dragged up the two flights of stairs when it was broken in the shop. (Sweet fellow, but not interested in her, she'd cut him a deal on a book of love poems for his help. Nice arrangement.) There was a small table serving as her nightstand that had her mother's silver hairbrush and the cheap tin candlestick she used to read by.

Candlesticks made her think of Mister Jacob S. Savage.

She still wasn't sure if she hadn't just dreamed up their entire encounter. It wouldn't be the strangest dream she'd ever had. There was the one time she imagined walking up an invisible staircase in the middle of the marketplace only to tumble back down because she tripped over a cat...

Too muzzy from sleep to think properly, Rachel drew her quilt over her head and tucked her feet up so she was a ball under the covers. It was too early to think of mysterious burnt men, or secret rooms, or nautical lore. Sleep. That was nice. Good, warm-fuzzy thought that was, sleep.

So, of course, the door at the top of the attic stairs that was, by extension, her bedroom door, would fly open with a bang that had her clawing her way out of her nest in a panic.

Her father. Just her father. Oh.

Jeremiah Fairbairn stomped three paces into the room and scowled, squinting at her. He needed his spectacles, though he was loath to admit it, and was doubtlessly hungover. "Rachel! Get up you lazy girl! Don't you remember we've got a shipment due in today?"

Oops!

"Sorry! I'll be down in just a minute Father!" Rachel jumped out of bed in her nightgown, her hair surely looking like a tangled mess of black wires. Her hair was thick and prone to knotting if she so much as walked in the rain. And her nightgown (really one of her father's old nightshirts,) was a shapeless sack with rolled-up sleeves, but was so comfortable Rachel hardly minded the hideous pinky-orange color.

Anyone who described women waking or sleeping as beautiful clearly had never seen a woman roll out of bed in the morning.

"You might as well take your precious time now, girly!" her father huffed, stalking back to the door. "I'm going down to the docks, you just get the shop open. Don't bother cooking anything, I'd rather not be living on the streets should you burn the place down."

The door slammed shut and Rachel bit the inside of her lip. She was an admittedly terrible cook, not for lack of trying. But when the only person she cooked for constantly told her not to bother and stomped down to the pub for a liquid dinner, it was hard to say if Rachel was honestly trying at all. She brushed out her tangle of hair and threw it into a bun, ignoring the fly-aways. Her pale pink dress had a bit of lace on the white collar and cuffs of her mid-length sleeves, and she fastened on a white leather belt she'd bought in a rare fit of whimsy. It had a small pouch just large enough for a small notebook and some pencils, sitting on her right hip, and in the shop she could keep change in it, too.

Rachel grabbed a bit of bread and spread some butter on it. She found not one, but two, jars of cherry jam in the back of a cabinet behind a dusty jar of pickled eggs, and enjoyed spreading some on her bread. It was amazing that her father hadn't eaten all the bread, but if he had, Rachel would have just as happily eaten the jam with a spoon by itself. As far as she was concerned, cherry jam was ambrosia from the gods.

Hurrying downstairs, Rachel unlocked the register and door to Starling Books, then made sure the floors were swept and clear for the deliveries. And then-because this was a bookstore,-she went through the different sections and selected three books to research while she sat at the counter waiting on customers to come in. Or her father to come back. Hopefully before the middle of the night.

The first book was a list of famous naval officers. Of course Commodore McIntyre was listed; Commodore Abraham McIntyre, stationed on Commodores Cove, served from y2049-y2090. How he rose from a fourteen-year-old recruit to youngest captain of a ship when serving as the commander and his captain fell overboard, promoted shortly thereafter. He made Commodore at the age of thiry-eight, shortly before McIntyre Castle was built and the men stationed there. Married Sarah in y2087. Sarah died and he fell mad with grief and committed suicide afterwards.

Referencing the second book, _Star-Crossed Lovers in History_ , Abraham and his wife were listed in a short article halfway through. Sarah was a very mysterious young lady. No one knew who she was until a few months before her wedding. She was something like fifteen years younger than Abraham, a mere twenty-seven when she died after vanishing from the public eye when she was sick. She'd spent almost two years wasting away in the castle, only really spent a year with Abraham out of their three years of marriage. Until death do you part...

The door bell jangled and Rachel slapped her book shut. Her father hated her reading at the counter (what did he expect her to do? Stare off into space?) and the last thing she was in the mood for was a scolding. Only instead of Jeremiah's stomping tread, there were two perfect strangers that came up to the counter when they saw her.

In the lead was a girl of no more than fourteen with short, shiny dark hair trimmed up to her ears and sea-green eyes, and the warm olive skintone of someone much farther south than the Northlands. She was very small and slight, but her smile was enormous in that way that spread over your whole face and filled your eyes. She wore a dark blue dress that looked very second-hand and colorfully patched stockings, an oversized man's jacket and a clunky pair of boots.

Trailing behind her, with a dark pipe in his mouth and a mass of thick, fluffy brown hair curling over his ears and flopping down his forehead, was a man of average height that was rather thick-set with a round, pleasant face and large blue eyes. Rachel placed him at either thirty, or a bit younger, perhaps. He had a doctor's bag with a leather strap slung over his shoulder, and wore a thick brown coat and a tweed vest under it, a colorful cravat tied at his throat and a hand in his trouser pockets.

It was the girl who spoke first: "Good morning!"

"Good morning," Rachel smiled back. "May I help you find something?"

The man grinned, clenching his pipe stem between his teeth. The whole effect was comedic and clownish. "McIntyre, man or castle? Anything pertaining to that subject there?"

Rachel smiled a bit wider, patting the books in front of her on the desk. "What sort of information are you looking for? His career, his love affair with Sarah, or, if you're simply looking for the history of the castle itself..."

She grabbed her third book, which she had yet to open. It was titled _Islands of the North_ , rather unimaginative perhaps, but Commodore Cove had a sordid history and was a favorite topic of study. "This is supposed to tell you everything known about McIntyre Castle's secrets," Rachel said, with a touch of secrecy bleeding into her smile.

_'At least until Mr. Savage finds the missing book...'_

The girl grinned widely and took the proffered volume. "I'll take that one please!"

"Oi!" the man frowned, moving to take the book from her. "You little magpie! That's my gift!"

"First come first serve!" the girl giggled, dancing out of his reach.

Rachel bit her lip, trying not to giggle herself as the man made a half-hearted lunge for the book that his young friend dodged around easily. "That will be a silver and copper, regardless. And would you like it wrapped?"

"Yes please!" The girl set the book back down on the counter, fishing out the coins from her coat pockets. "It's a birthday present."

"I'd like to buy the one on McIntyre's career, if you please," the man added. "How much for that?"

"Silver and two-copper," Rachel replied, taking the plain brown paper and string from under the counter to start wrapping the first book. It was a very drab wrapping for a present, but perhaps the recipient wouldn't mind?

The girl leaned on her elbows on the counter, one hand loosely curled around her money as she watched Rachel wrap up the books. Her companion sucked on his pipe, though it wasn't lit, and asked, "You live 'round here, do you?"

"Born and raised, yes. Why?"

"D'you know anything about the old castle? You hear all sorts of things about it being haunted. Any truth to those rumors?"

Rachel wasn't sure if she'd ever believed McIntyre Castle was haunted, but she definitely knew there was someone living there now. Not that she wanted to say that; Rachel didn't have any friends really, but if she did, they'd know she was the best secret-keeper in Buchanan Town. She just smiled pleasantly and finished tying the knot on the first book and accepting the girl's coins.

"I can't say there is any truth."

"But you can't say there isn't, either?" the girl asked. And Rachel must've shown something because then the girl grinned, hugging the packaged book to her chest. What a cheeky little thing.

Her companion gently flicked her ear, waving a silver piece under her nose. "You got change for a silver? I've only got one copper."

"Then you can tip the lady on account of excellent service."

"Oh, come off it my little magpie, do a mate a favor?"

"Nope. I'm still waiting on that silver favor from last time I lent you money!"

"I have change for a silver, sir," Rachel said.

"Oh, I'm sure you do, miss," he smiled around his pipe, widening his eyes. "But y'see, it's so much more fun to annoy my little friend."

Rachel took in the wide eyes and toothy smile. She wasn't sure if this man "had all his pearls strung on a necklace," to quote one of her mother's favorite sayings. So, she quickly wrapped his book with a neat twine bow and handed back his three-coppers in change from the two-silver he paid. It wouldn't do to upset a mad person, even if he were being perfectly polite now.

"Thank you miss!" the man grinned again, popping the book into his bag. Rachel thought she saw a stethoscope in there, and a few glass bottles of something. Was he a doctor? "Lovely doing business with you!"

"Yes, thank you!" the girl added, bouncing on her toes. "We'll see you again soon!"

Something buzzed in Rachel's mind: "Oh? Are you planning on staying in Buchanan Town awhile, or have you moved in?"

A funny sort of smile crossed the man's face.

"I'm not quite sure yet, really. We've got a friend to find and a birthday to attend first. We'll let you know then."

Before Rachel could ask what that meant, the bell rang again and a tall, dark-skinned man with short-cropped black curls and vest covered with ornate stitching stuck his head in, his deep brown eyes settling on the pair.

"Doc," he called, his voice deep and rich with a Mistlander's choppy accent. "Gabe's looking for you two, come on!"

"Coming Joe!" the girl scurried to him, her package under her arm. "Guess what? I got Jakey a present! You wanna split it with me?"

"Oi! You'll let him share a present with you, but not me? He didn't even chip in on it!"

"Yes." The girl nodded solemnly, and Joe, the Mistlander, grinned a big, crescent-moon grin as he held the door for the girl to dart out.

The man was left behind to shuffle out on his own, shaking his head, and the door was closed before Rachel could realize what the girl said: She had a present for Jakey.

Jake.

Jacob?

Didn't Jacob S. Savage mention he had associates coming in to help him find the treasure? In the castle? Rachel rushed around the desk and hurried to the door, but it swang open and her father stormed in cursing a blue streak.

"Damned fools! _Damned_ _fools!_ All of them!" Jeremiah swore, and Rachel switched directions to hurry after him. "Ship got delayed! Bad weather, they said! _Ha!_ More like a lazy crew that couldn't chart where it was headed! You mark my words, come this evening they'll be in port and swimming up to their bloody eyes in booze, absolutely useless to me tomorrow when I need help moving heavy crates of books!"

Rachel had learned not to say "I could help" because then her father would sneer at her and either make disparaging comments about how he wished for a son, or at least a male employee who could "pull his own weight", or he would start to laugh at her and her wispy figure. Instead, she trotted back behind the counter and stayed quiet, even as Jeremiah stomped upstairs. If her instincts were right, then he was going to have a few glasses of something than stomp back downstairs and demand she fix lunch. (Sandwiches.) Then he'd either feign interest in their ledgers or go out and get up to no good.

Holding in a weary sigh, Rachel let her head rest in her hands, elbows propped up on the counter. Her father made her very tired. Very, _very_ tired.

Once she got her cut of that treasure, Rachel was going to head south. She felt confident that she could secure a position in the Southlands somewhere- _anywhere_ ,-as a schoolteacher, or maybe she could open her own bookshop, and the idea of being a spinster didn't frighten her in the least.

Not as much as being stuck in this town under this roof for the rest of her life did.


	5. The Principle Players

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter should have artwork including all the main characters, mentioned in this chapter, hence the title "The Principle Players". So enjoy!

Jacob had arrived at the castle three days before meeting Miss Fairbairn. He'd counted himself lucky that the front gate of the walls had been unlocked, although now that he knew a little fairy had sawed the chain off the handles, it was more amusing than lucky. Figuring out the code on those button-keys had taken the better part of a day, and it was almost dark by the time he finally cracked it.

Rachel Fairbairn must've really had a little magic, because she seemed to think that door was simple to open.

The foyer of Castle McIntyre was very dusty, but considering how old the castle was and that it was surrounded by water, it was in excellent condition without so much as a mildew stain on the peeling wallpaper. The amount of cobwebs didn't bear thinking, as there was nothing natural about arachnids, but Jacob supposed it could have been worse. It could have been snakes. He detested snakes. It wasn't natural for any vertebrate to slither around like that. Ick.

Like Rachel had mentioned, there was something very odd about the castle though. It had all the hallmarks of a fine house; Tile floors and fine furniture, expensive bric-a-brac and quality antiques, and gilded frames for the portraits and paintings on the walls. However, some of the big doors were locked...and not by ordinary locks. Some were like puzzles, and others had peculiarly shaped keyholes. Those were hard to pick, so Jacob settled on exploring the available rooms first.

Having grown up in a three-room flat on the middle floor of a crumbling tenement, he couldn't comprehend why one home needed so many rooms to sit in. A sitting room, a parlor, a smoking room, the formal dining room, another room with a dining table...

Jacob wondered what Abraham had been seeing for his future when he built the place. Hardly mattered since the old commodore's life was cut short, but...still...

The kitchen was a mess. Whatever food remained behind the rats got, and what they left had long rotted away. It was too dark to see outside the dim light of Jacob's lantern, windows boarded shut as they were, but clearly there was a lot of work to be done before you could even consider cooking.

There was a door that probably led outside, to a garden maybe. He decided to look at that later and went back to the foyer, and the stairwell blocked off by a metal grate. He had seen the scales, but since there were no weights, he went back out to the blacksmith's shop and gathered some tools to pry it open.

Jacob was tall, but very thin. He squeezed through the opening he'd made by bending the metals bars apart and continued to the second floor.

Here, in the long hallway, there was light, softly streaming in through the dusty window at the end. The hall was filled with peculiarities, three different sextants on a little end table and telescopes piled in an umbrella stand. There were old pistols sitting among the dusty antiques, and Jacob picked one up to give it an inspection.

It was discharged, and upon closer look, there were several pistols lying around the hall. Ones sitting on the table were usually loaded, but some looked to have been flung down after firing. Some were on the ground, lying on the dirty rug, too. The bullets were lodged in the walls, in the plaster beneath the crackling wallpaper. One had punctured an oil painting of a ship, another had gone into the floor.

Jacob set the gun down and caught a movement on his left. All his left eye could make out was motion and shapes though, so he couldn't say what it was that made him turn.

On either side of the lit window, was a door. The left door locked, with an interestingly shaped keyhole. A sort of large square, with a dip at the top. The right door was also locked, but the knob was removed. There was also a disturbing amount of bullet-holes in the door and around the frame....

_Something just touched him._

The lantern slipped from Jacob's hand as he whirled around, his knife sliding easily from his sleeve to his palm. Someone had just brushed his back from behind--but there was no one there.

The smell of oil burning and smoke made Jacob remember that his lantern was _burning_ away at his feet and he hurried to stamp out the rug before the fire spread anywhere. By the time he succeeded, the momentary feeling of unease had lifted. Unfortunately, now that he'd broken his lantern, he'd be at the mercy of daylight until he found another torch.

He had figured that the library would have candles, and that was why he'd gone in there. He surely hadn't been expecting Rachel Fairbairn, though, she hadn't expected him either.

His life had only gotten odder over the years, hadn't it?

He doubted that there was actually a ghost of Abraham McIntyre haunting the castle. The old man had gone completely barmy after Sarah died, why would his ghost want to haunt the place?

Still...it felt like someone had put a hand on his back, upstairs, outside the room with the missing knob. And the upstairs hallway always felt cold. Jacob was certain that it was the wind and just the fact that he really wasn't used to being alone in total silence twenty-four hours a day, (why ever had he thought he'd miss the quiet?) all that could have made him jumpy.

At least...that was his explanation until he went to sleep for the first time in the castle. It was the same day that he'd met Rachel in the library, and he'd removed his things from the blacksmith's where he'd been sleeping before. There were several bedrooms, but Jacob didn't trust half-century-old beds to hold a body, especially one his length. All accounts of Commodore McIntyre placed him as being about Jacob's size, unsurprisingly, but the idea of sleeping in his bed was just about as unappealing as removing his own eyelids with a fork.

So, Jacob beat the dust off one of the couch cushions and put his satchel under his head for a pillow. This piece of furniture may have once been red velvet, now just about ruined as far as upholstery went, and unless he was mistaken, it was one of those fainting couches ladies swooned on. What had Doc called it? A chaise longue. To Jacob, it was just a long couch with a oddly shaped back and missing an arm on one end. It was just long enough that the heels of his booted feet hung off the ends, which was better than he could have hoped for, and as comfy as a cloud after sleeping rough for so long. He fell asleep quickly there, but not deeply.

He'd never been a deep sleeper, Jacob. As a child he'd been waiting on his father to come home, and when he and his brother started sleeping rough on the streets in Stuckrow, they learned quickly that those who sleep soundly, lose much. Maria liked to tease that he slept with one eye open, but she wasn't far wrong.

So when someone sat on the end of the sofa, Jacob could feel it. The dip in the cushions, the weight of the body right by his knees. His eyes were still shut but he wasn't sure how long he had been asleep, what time it was, or who was sitting and staring at him. He could probably whip out his knife if they meant him harm, or perhaps it was one of his heathen horde come early?

Counting to three, Jacob opened his eyes and bolted upright.

No one was there but a swirl of silvery motes caught in the early morning sunlight peeking through the curtains...

* * *

Maria Capello had known Jacob S. Savage since she was very small, after her mama had passed away. He was her "big brother", in a lot of ways, since he'd taken her under his wing when she first wound up on the streets. His brother wasn't as nice, and got them into so much trouble eventual Jacob talked her into staying with a kindly old lady who sold tarts on the nicer end of Stuckrow.

They called it Stuckrow, so Maria had always been told, on account of how it was the slums of the Deadbranch Boroughs of the Northlands. People fell mighty far to end up in Stuckrow, and the ones born there rarely left without being clapped in irons first. You were stuck there. It wasn't all crime-filled alleys and shady streets, just mostly on the south side. Where they had lived until Jacob set her up with Her Majesty. (Her name was Mabel Jessup, but they all called her _Her Majesty_ on account of how she'd give slices of tarts away at the end of the day, a queen among their sorry lot, and nobody was allowed to hurt her or they'd be found in a gutter in hours.) That had been nice, but when Maria was twelve Mrs. Jessup passed, too, and Jacob returned to take her under his wing again.

They'd never hurt anybody, (well, they never _seriously_ hurt anybody, if you count a few scuffles,) and for the most part their little group straddled the line between criminal and law-abiding.

So, when she heard about Jacob's plan to head to the coast, she was intrigued. Nobody really knew what the angle was until Jacob left one morning ahead of them and Gabe spelled it out: Ol' Jake was about to inherit a bit of property and they were going to set up shop. As good as legal to boot.

Not perfectly legal, of course, but close enough.

Gabriel W. Pratt-Lowe III was from a large family of powerful solicitors, judges, and barristers and such as that. However, Gabe didn't want to go into legal practice. He wanted to be an actor, and he was very good at it. His father flipped his lid and threw him out, however, saying when he wisened up he could come back and make something of himself.

Well, Gabe had yet to return. His dream of being an actor was still there, but he'd gotten himself into a jam he couldn't quiet wriggle out of, which resulted in him falling in with them. Gabe had a real flair for the dramatic, but he could be most convincing. So he dug up a suit and oiled his hair back, and strode into the courthouse and land offices when they got to Buchanan Town and put on his bit as Mr. Pratlow, representing Mr. Savage, with the paperwork drawn up proving his claim to the castle and lands on Commodore Cove and the money.

"Money is the maker," Gabe claimed. "It makes the laws and breaks the laws, never doubt that!"

Apparently he was right, because once a large portion of their savings was handed over, Gabe came swanning up to them as they left the bookshop with a thick stack of papers in his hand. Their resident thespian, (as Jake called him,) was a man of average height and a slim, fit build, currently wearing a fine frock coat and pale gold silk vest, and his shiny shoes. His bright red hair was combed back and his grin assured everyone of his success before he said a word. He would've been a fine lawyer, Maria thought. He could lie like a rug.

Joe, (Maria doubted that was his real name, but that was the one he gave to everyone,) had his large rucksack stuffed full of food provisions he'd been tasked with getting. There might be ingredients for a birthday meal in there, but not much. Until they found the missing loot in the castle, things would be a little tight for their group. Since Doc Morris went with her to the bookstore, and Jake was at the castle, that meant...

Doc was on it, frowning for the first time that day as he drew the pipe out of his mouth. "Where did Edmund go?"

"He said he was going to find you," Joe said, nodding at Gabe since his hands were full.

Gabe groaned, plopping the papers inside his top hat before putting that on his head. (Maria wondered why the papers never got oily...) "Just great. That one is probably halfway to drunk at a pub right now-"

"Have some faith, Mr. Pratlow."

Gabe whirled around, wide-eyed, on Edmund Arnold, who stood behind him with a sly grin on his fox-face.

"Blast it all Arnold! Don't do that!"

"Do what? Breathe?"

Maria had never been as fond of dark-eyed, fair-haired Edmund as she had the rest of her surrogate brothers. (And they were brothers, as they annoyed and loved her with equal measure and were always quick to keep her out of harm's way.) He'd fallen in with them a few months ago, slithered up from the Southlands somewhere with a different way of talking and a poorer set of people skills. Maria suspected Jacob was growing tired of him too, but just when he went to get rid of him, Edmund proved his worth as their best set of eyes and ears.

Doc grabbed his arm, and Edmund's smirk melted. Doc was the only one, besides Jacob, that he didn't mock or tease. Maria had always thought of Doc as a big teddy bear of a man, but he was still big. Broad of body and sharp of mind, very dangerous when roused. Just like a bear.

"Well now that we're _all_ here," he cut his blue eyes at Edmund, who shrank. "We'd best be on our way up to the castle. I want to be inside before it gets dark, it gets chilly in these parts."

Their de facto leader giving his orders, they started down the street towards the harbor. Surely there was a boat they could rent to get to the island, as Maria didn't want to steal one. Waterfront toughs were among the, well, tougher groups one could cross. Whether it was the rum or fierce competition with wharf rats, she was never sure.

"You don't suppose this castle's actually haunted, do you?" Gabe asked, rubbing his hands together. "Like, _haunted_ haunted? With slamming doors and rattling chains and mysteriously breaking china?"

"Well, if any ghost is living there," Maria said, tucking her wrapped book inside her jacket. "Jacob must've scared them out by now, doncha think?"

* * *

Rachel's father was in a snit the rest of the day, and the day after that. The "day or two" she thought it would take before she could sneak away to McIntyre Castle again took almost four, and by then, she was nearly breaking down the door in her rush out the shop that day.

She did pause, however, to take the one unopened jar of cherry jam out and wrap it in her shawl for safe transport.

Mr. Savage had mentioned that he'd be twenty-five a week from next Tuesday four days ago. So, as it was now Thursday after said Tuesday, and she had no idea when she'd be back if her father's foul mood remained, it was only polite to bring a gift of sorts. If it was too early, she could always claim it was a housewarming gift. Besides, doing little random acts of kindness made Rachel feel less bleak about being stuck with an alcoholic father who only noticed her when his laundry piled up or supper was late.

Gods...she needed that money from McIntyre Castle so desperate she was almost willing to do more than help find it.

(Almost. She still had a shred of pride and dignity left, even if Jacob S. Savage was a perfect gentleman.)

Scurrying down to where Old Mister Brown kept his boat, Rachel found it in the usual place and immediately set out across the smooth waters. She tied it in the usual place and dashed to the front gate, (open of course,) and paused outside of the door to smooth her hair and brush off her skirts so she didn't look like she'd dashed all the way here. Cleanliness next to godliness, and all that. Her face was probably red and sweaty, she realized belatedly, pushing the unlocked door open and slipping inside.

But...something was off in the foyer.

It wasn't that the floor had been swept. No. She expected that, especially since she suspected Savage's friends had arrived by now and there were more hands to clean with. And it wasn't that she couldn't hear anyone bustling about, that was quite normal, too.

Rachel didn't know what was wrong, but something did feel wrong. Very wrong.

She had gingerly wandered towards the library by now, clutching the strap of her satchel in her sweaty hands. She was just reaching into her bag for her little paring knife when an arm slid around her belly and a rough, dirty hand clamped over her mouth as that arm yanked her back against a male body.

Rachel's hand and flown out of her bag without the knife, and she was too busy trying to pry his hand off her mouth to think about reaching for it again.

The man-definitely a man,-laughed as she thrashed, and Rachel realized there was only one thing to do:

She bit his hand and when he cursed, she screamed, _"HELP ME!"_ before the hand locked over her mouth again.

**Author's Note:**

> The inspiration for the history of the castle can be found on the PC game _A Legacy Tale: Mercy of the Gallows_ , which is a great game but doesn't greatly affect these two as far as they go, so feel free to find and play it!
> 
> (Anybody who works at Legacy Interactive, this has nothing to do with you, this series is called "Legacy" because it fits my theme, so sorry, don't sue me!)


End file.
